abcnovels
Chapter 317: The Game is On
Chapter 317: The Game is On
Chapter 317: The Game is On
If you want to support me check out my patron at /athassprkr
I tend to upload drafts of early chapters on there to get people's opinions of them so you can read up to 20 chapters ahead as a bonus.
I would like to thank my beta, Akisu, for his help in this chapter.
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13th May 2013, Svartalfheim
(Jasmine Sayre POV)
I still remembered the main weaknesses that the Entropy avatar had. The first weakness was that he was a creature of pure energy, should I drain it somehow, it should kill him and leave the actual entity outside of the universe to be dealt with by his peers. There was also the fact that he was bound by a linear perspective of time. I could trap him in a time loop like I did the last time, but he would see such an attack coming.
Slowly, a plan came into mind, and I looked at using my Death vision to approve its viability. When I got the result, I grinned. He played with me last time and it was time to make him pay for it. The game is on.
Immediately, I leapt towards my opponent, manipulating the space between us so that I would arrive in a fraction of a second. Entropy's eyes barely widened when I arrived, but he was able to parry my attacks with his sword.
Undeterred, I conjured thousands of small spikes from the air, which he turned into dust the moment they came even close to him. I could feel him continuously using the Mind Stone, trying to break into my mind, but I had long ago learnt how to protect mine, which was even more protected when I wielded the Space Stone.
Seemingly fed up with the exchange, he feinted an attack with his sword and punched me, sending me flying back. Too bad for him, as I flew back, I opened a portal behind him and used my momentum to kick him in the chest.
Entropy flew back but used the Necrosword to stabilize himself and land on his feet. He glared at me, and I gave him a smirk while pointing at his cheek. He touched it and felt the black ichor on the small scratch on his right cheek. He stared at it, looking perturbed, and snarled back at me. I had used the Space Stone to make a small, and invisible blade of space, that cut him without him knowing.
I spoke up, "first blood goes to me, Entropy."
He sneered at me, and the Reality Stone started glowing maliciously. Well, the kid gloves are off, I guess. He created a cloud of shadows in front of him, that destroyed everything around it and floated ominously at me.
I used the Space Stone to scatter the cloud and sent it through another portal. With another wave, I summoned a meteor above him, and it fell down, burning, towards my opponent. Entropy yelled in exertion and waved the Necrosword, the Reality Stone visibly glowing. A beam of red shadows formed from the extremity and fell towards the falling meteor which seemed to consume the rock entirely.
Damn, the synergy between Entropy's powers and the Reality Stone was deeply disturbing. The stone was very attuned to darkness and destruction, and it was very dangerous at the hands of someone like Entropy.
Truthfully, outside the Soul Stone, I would say that the Reality Stone is the most dangerous infinity stone. In a way, it could be used to change the state of matter of anything. Not to mention the fact that it could be used for large-scale illusions that would make Loki's look like child's play. The only weakness, if one can even call it that, would be the fact that actual reality manipulation could only be done on a small scale, and was temporary if it wasn't enhanced by the Power Stone that is.
I theorized that it was the Reality Stone that would be the main catalyst in Thanos' snap which would kill half the universe using transmutation. The rest of the stones would simply enhance the range and power of the stone, and stabilize the consequences of the snap.
But now, my enemy who was an entity attuned to darkness and destruction was given a weapon capable of channeling his power efficiently, rendering the risk of being drained out of existence through large scale attacks moot.
I needed to deal with him quickly because the more he acclimates to the stone, the more dangerous he becomes. Using the Space Stone, I created a mini dark hole that flew at him at a tremendous pace. Entropy used the Reality Stone to transform it into a ball of darkness that he turned into a beam, and sent back at me. I simply shaped the space around the beam to bend it and make it miss me, hitting one of the remaining Dark Elven spaceships. The ship was turned into dust in mere seconds.
This was getting us nowhere. Two infinity stones fighting is a recipe for a stalemate. I needed to do things differently. I barely noticed Entropy wave his sword, still powered by the Reality Stone. In mere seconds, the battlefield disappeared, and the sun went out. Everywhere around me was nothing but darkness, and while I usually thrived in it, Entropy was by far a more powerful master of the dark than I ever could be.
Fortunately, my Death Sight did not actually use light to work, as it relied on the energies of the universe. The moment I activated it, I noticed the blade coming at my throat. I was able to bend the space around it, making it miss, but there was still a large slash on my chest.
In my panic, I used the Space Stone to create a telekinetic push that would have flattened an entire city. The attack dispelled the darkness and sent my opponent flying back, away from me.
I could feel the wound on my chest resisting my natural healing. The wound would heal, but it will do so in normal time, and will probably scar permanently. I growled at my enemy, who was smirking at me, "You aren't Death's avatar anymore, are you? I knew something was different about you, but I never expected this to happen. At least you're outside the bitch's protection which means I can kill you as easily as I want to, without having to worry about any retaliation."
While he was doing his little smug speech, I used that time to my advantage. Discreetly, I started working on my plan, creating small runes in the sand using my telekinesis, which I kept clouded using an illusion.
The cosmic entity leapt towards me, gathering an orb of darkness in his hand and it raised at me. I let him come; bringing the fight to him didn't seem to be working. He seemed to be satisfied with my action, probably thinking that I had given up and accepted my death. However, seconds before he arrived, I started stretching the space between us. The few yards between us became miles, and from Entropy's baffled expression, he didn't see that coming. While he was still leaping through the air, I summoned my chains of Enkidu, through a dozen portals, and bound the cosmic entity as much as possible, freezing every single limb he had.
The chains were very powerful when dealing with Gods and Demons, or more appropriately, beings of pure energy. They constrained the energy output of these beings, stopping them from releasing their magic or casting any spell. Mages or mutants bound by the chains would feel weaker and wouldn't be able to use their powers, but beings of pure energy like Entropy would feel as if they were actively drained of their very being. Unfortunately, the effect was too passive to work on draining Entropy to death, but it's enough to freeze him for a fraction of a second. And that's all the time I needed to activate the second layer of my plan.
It was the smaller rune circle that involved a time dilation barrier that would slow down Entropy's perspective of time immensely. It had proved to be a weakness of his, and with my new cosmic core, powering something like that up wasn't too draining.
I grinned to myself as the cosmic entity's snarling face froze in time. I had to do this because the next step of the plan would take slightly longer, and I didn't know how long the chains could hold him still, especially with two infinity stones in his grasp.
With that done, I activated the final layer, which was a bastardized ritual originating from one that was supposed to create ley lines by absorbing the power of another one. The ritual started absorbing the energy inside the circle, and I dispelled the time freezing array since it would be absorbed by it anyway.
Immediately, Entropy's frozen face returned to normal, and he immediately noticed that something was wrong, "What's happening, what are you doing?"
I stood outside the ritual circle, my face frozen doing my best to maintain the ritual. Slowly, Entropy's form started to stutter and fade slightly, and I thought gleefully to myself that it was working. My death vision didn't show me how to kill him because he couldn't be killed. However, the fact that his form was vulnerable and that I knew these vulnerabilities, allowed me to model an attack that would hurt as much as possible, and it was working.
It didn't take long for the cosmic entity to realize what I was doing. It seems that he had forgotten that in this form he wasn't a powerful cosmic entity, just an avatar of one. He wasn't Endless anymore.
Everything seemed to be working until the chains started to get strained. I could understand why they were weakened since their energy was being absorbed by the ritual, but it was the best way to stop him from moving. Unfortunately, this small weakness was enough to allow him to use the Reality Stone and shatter them entirely. With Entropy free from the chains, he was still very much being drained. He seemed to try to alter the ritual to no avail. I foresaw something like this happening anyway and had manipulated the ritual to only stop when the wards are destroyed.
He seemed to realize this and started bombarding the wards, which I was powering with everything I had. I needed to weaken him as much as possible. He kept hitting the wards again and again, and I almost felt like I was being hit again. I even channeled the Space Stone's energy into maintaining the wards. But Entropy seemed to guess that and combined his two stones, overwhelming mine, and destroying the ritual. I knew that what I did wouldn't hold him indefinitely; I created this ritual in this very duel, and I was unprepared for the confrontation. Yet I still hoped that it would work somehow, that my final opponent would die on this night, setting me free from my duties, and allowing me to retire.
The backlash sent the two of us flying back. As I got up, I saw him being in pain for the first time since I saw him all those years ago and smiled to myself in satisfaction. He slowly got up at the same pace I did. And we faced against each other.
For the first time, I felt like I could see some small acknowledgement of respect from him, and I couldn't stop feeling like I felt the same towards him. This was a powerful foe, a worthy opponent. I visibly noticed that he was weakened, and as disconnected from the cosmic energies of the universe, he needed to actively recharge his avatar. A drain of this size had severely crippled him, at least for a while.
I was still hurt by the impact, and the Necrosword wound wasn't helping things. We stared at each other for what felt like hours until we ran towards one another in what was our final clash of the fight. The both of us channeled our weapons, swinging our weapons downwards. Two energy beams, one dark blue and another dark red clashed in the space between us. I could feel the impact create a giant explosion that leveled the battlefield and yet the two of us stayed unmoved.
I channeled everything I had into the attack, which I had enhanced with the Space Stone, and I was losing. It seemed that even as drained as he was, he had more raw power than me, or maybe the two stones enhanced his power enough to overwhelm me, and my single stone, in a contest of pure power.
Seeing that I was about to lose, I controlled the cosmic energy in the two beams and compressed them using the Space Stone into a single point, to my opponent's confusion. Although his eyes seemed to widen when I released both energies in an arc of malicious energy that cut everything in front of me. I had added a small energy nullification property into the wave, turning a fraction of it into antimatter that should, technically speaking, hurt him.
To make sure it hits, I shortened the path between my attack and Entropy. And yet, the cosmic entity was able to use the Necrosword to deflect the blow, but not entirely. The attack seemed to have visibly hurt him; the attack was stupidly powerful, and it had continued towards a mountain that was actually split in half by the impact. The cosmic entity's chest was visibly blackened, the right side of his face looked almost burnt, and one of his arms looked more like a blackened limb of ash than anything else, he was barely able to hold onto his sword. The best part was the fact that he wasn't healing himself. He was too drained to do so.
I stood proudly in front of my opponent with my staff raised, hiding how much that took out of me. The cosmic entity glared at me, "this isn't over."
I ran at him to finish the fight, only for him to use the Reality Stone to summon a cloud of darkness. I dispelled the cloud, but my enemy had disappeared. I couldn't sense him, but I could tell that he had left this realm.
Suddenly, I felt the actual weight of what I had done today. I fought Entropy on equal ground and managed to get him to run, even if he ended up escaping with an infinity stone in his hands. Absentmindedly, I opened a portal to Asgard's healing chambers, and the moment I entered, I let the darkness consume me and fell unconscious.
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If you want to support me check out my patron at /athassprkr
I tend to upload drafts of early chapters on there to get people's opinions of them so you can read up to 20 chapters ahead as a bonus.
Thank you guys for your support in these hard times.